Headlines for Monday

Irene could leave many without power for weeks

AP

9:04 PM 08/28/11

It could take weeks to restore power to millions of people left in the dark by Tropical Storm Irene.

The lights went out for more than seven million people and businesses from Folly Beach, S.C., to Portland, Maine. And thousands of utility workers have begun the race to restore power.

Getting the lights back on will be an enormous job for crews fanning across the East Coast. Irene ripped down power lines and crushed critical equipment near power plants. It flooded coastal cities with seawater, dousing electrical stations and threatening underground wires. Crews are still assessing the damage.

For article GO HERE

Irene heads north as death toll mounts, floodwaters rise

McClatchy

August 28, 2011

NEW YORK —Already a killer storm, Irene sloshed through the New York metropolitan area Sunday, briefly flooding parts of the city and severing power to a million people but not provoking the doomsday urban disaster that had been feared.

Diminished to a tropical storm and racing to its own overnight demise in New England and Canada, Irene killed at least 18 people in six states. More than 4.5 million customers lost power along the East Coast and well inland. Initial property damage estimates ranged up to $7 billion.

And it was not over yet.

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Cesium in incinerator dust across East Japan

Japan Times

Sunday, Aug. 28, 2011

High levels of cesium isotopes are cropping up in dust at 42 incineration plants in seven prefectures, including Chiba and Iwate, an Environment Ministry survey of the Kanto and Tohoku regions shows.

According to the report, released late Saturday, the highest cesium levels in the dust ranged from 95,300 becquerels in Fukushima Prefecture and 70,800 becquerels in Chiba Prefecture to 30,000 becquerels in Iwate Prefecture.

But even the lower levels in the dust exceeded 8,000 becquerels per kilogram in Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma and Tokyo.

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Iran warns NATO against entering Syria "quagmire"

News Daily
Aug. 28, 2011

TEHRAN - Iran warned NATO on Sunday against any temptation to intervene in Syria, saying that rather than the defeating a regime it would be bogged down in a "quagmire" similar to Iraq or Afghanistan.

Syria's closest ally in the Middle East, Iran has in recent days tempered its strong support for President Bashar al-Assad with calls for him to respect the "legitimate demands" of his people.

But with the fall of Libya's Muammar Gaddafi, aided by NATO bombings, Tehran is concerned at the possible, if unlikely, prospect of something similar happening in Syria.

For article GO HERE

Another allied story AVAILABLE HERE

Iran Warns Of Crisis In The Region If Syria Falls

Euro bail-out in doubt as "hysteria" sweeps Germany

German Chancellor Angela Merkel no longer has enough coalition votes in the Bundestag to secure backing for Europe's revamped rescue machinery, threatening a consitutional crisis in Germany and a fresh eruption of the euro debt saga

the Telegraph,

28 August, 2011

Mrs Merkel has cancelled a high-profile trip to Russia on September 7, the crucial day when the package goes to the Bundestag and the country's constitutional court rules on the legality of the EU's bail-out machinery.

If the court rules that the €440bn rescue fund (EFSF) breaches Treaty law or undermines German fiscal sovereignty, it risks setting off an instant brushfire across monetary union.

The seething discontent in Germany over Europe's debt crisis has spread to all the key institutions of the state. "Hysteria is sweeping Germany " said Klaus Regling, the EFSF's director

For article GO HERE